Rhonda Y. Williams

I came into this text expecting a public policy perspective on public housing and its issues supplemented and nuanced by the experiences of black women. I found the reverse to be true however i was not disappointed. The author Rhonda Williams provides us with something akin to a piece of anthropology of the black woman's experience in public housing centering on Baltimore, Maryland from public housing inception to the present day challenges. It recounts the struggles of these women for and with respectability. It recounts the class, gender, and race based discrimination these women struggled against. Most importantly it provides a specific example of black women doing activist work, doing direct action, addressing community needs, building organizations, and challenging oppressive power structures in a world that still largely not only ignorant of those contributions but will also deny the serious of their struggle and unique experience as black women.

The best part of this text is the epilogue where Williams deftly ties together the historical public housing tenant struggle with racism, respectability, and current public housing issues and activism.… (mere)